A color photographic picture is a color image to be obtained by developing a photographic material having, on a support, photographic constitutive layers containing dye-forming couplers (hereinafter referred to as couplers) and silver halide emulsions, with an aromatic primary amine color developing agent, in which the couplers are reacted with the oxidation product of the developing agent to form dyes.
It is extremely required in the color photographic industry to simplify and rapidly process the color development to form color images, and various improvements have heretofore been made according to this requirement to develop new, more simple and rapid systems.
To rapidly process color photographic materials, it is preferred that the materials have high silver chloride emulsions.
On the other hand, in order to obtain color photographic images of a high quality, it is needed to elevate the sharpness of the images. For this, various methods have heretofore been proposed.
For instance, water-soluble dyes are generally added to photographic materials. This technology is described in, for example, JP-A 62-283336 (the term "JP-A" as used herein means an "unexamined published Japanese patent application"), Research Disclosure RD-17643 (December 1978, page 22), RD-18716 (November 1979, page 647).
JP-A 63-286849 discloses a method of providing an anti-halation layer containing a colorant that can be decolored by development, such as a colloidal silver or a solid dye dispersion, in a color photographic material so as to elevate the sharpness of the color image to be formed in the material.
However, if water-soluble dyes and anti-halation layers are applied to the above-mentioned photographic materials that have high silver chloride emulsions from the preferred viewpoint for their rapid processing and if the content of the colorants or dyes added are increased to such a degree that is necessary for satisfactorily elevating the sharpness of the color images to be formed, the sensitivity of the photographic materials is lowered and the degree of whiteness of the processed photographic materials is lowered. Because of these problems, it was impossible to obtain high silver chloride photographic materials capable of giving color images having a sufficient degree of sharpness.
Referring to another means for elevating the sharpness of a color photographic image, it is described in JP-A 3-156452 to increase the content of a white pigment to be in the waterproof resin layer constituting the support of a photographic material. Unexpectedly, however, it has been found that, when this means is applied to the above-mentioned photographic materials that have high silver chloride emulsions from the preferred viewpoint for their rapid processing and when the photographic materials and the developed prints, to which this means has been applied, are cut with a dull cutter, the edges of the thus-cut pieces cannot be sharp but are rough while releasing considerable wastes. In addition to this drawback, it has also been found that the edges of the thus-cut pieces become yellowed after development. As still another problem, the color density of the developed photographic materials is lowered when they are folded.
As mentioned above, the conventional means that have heretofore been proposed for obtaining photographic materials which have a high sensitivity and a high degree of sharpness and which can be processed rapidly are all unsatisfactory. Therefore, it is desired to develop novel techniques capable of satisfying the current requirements in the color photographic industry.